Budget £100~ upgrade advice

Hi, it's been a while since I've been in the hardware of computing but my auntie is wanting to upgrade her windows ME PC to XP, and in turn requires a hardware upgrade.

It will be used simply for internet browsing and the use of Office applications, nothing intense at all. Looking at onboard GFX & Audio, will need a new motherboard, cpu, ram, and depending on the total of those, possibly even a new HDD.

Having a budget of no more than £100ish, to buy 2nd hand parts (eBay is the likely source) what would people suggest is the best upgrades?

Re: Budget £100~ upgrade advice

What is the spec. of the current machine? Can you use the case or do you need a new one. At a guess I'd say if it is running windows ME then you should be looking at replacing everything bar the monitor.

Re: Budget £100~ upgrade advice

I think you've almost answered your own question... just bundle together whatever you can get. Sort out 2x512MB of DDR2 RAM, then find the cheapest motherboard and CPU combination you can find with DDR2 support, AMD might be a better option.

I'm assuming you've already got a version of XP available, and the PSU from the old machine is okay to go, so I doubt there's a lot more to it.

Re: Budget £100~ upgrade advice

Yeah was looking at AM2, DDR2 etc, as their ancestor - the DDR & SKT939 ranges are getting quite expensive....

Yep all software is catered for - just need the core hardware components. Any "extras" like a bigger HDD and optional fans or optical drives can be added later.

Have to check the PSU next time I go, can't see it being anything good - what are the basic requirements of a PSU powering let's say 2 sticks of DDR2 ram, a budget AM2 mobo setup, a hdd and 2 opticals?